PART I. § 5, l. 5. _the remenant_, &c. i.e. the rest of this line (drawn,
as I said,) from the foresaid cross to the border. This appears awkward, and we should have expected 'fro the forseide _centre_,' as Mr. Brae suggests; but there is no authority for making the alteration. As the reading stands, we must put no comma after 'this lyne,' but read right on without a pause.
8. _principals._ It it not unusual to find adjectives of French origin retaining _s_ in the plural; only they commonly _follow_ their nouns when thus spelt. Cf. _lettres capitals_, i. 16. 8; _sterres fixes_, i. 21. 4. On the other hand, we find _principal cercles_, i. 17. 34.
§ 7. 4. _noumbres of augrim_; Arabic numerals. The degrees of the border are said to contain 4 minutes _of time_, whilst the degrees of the signs are divided into minutes and seconds of angular measurement, the degrees in each case being the same. There is no confusion in practice between these, because the former are used in measuring time, the latter in measuring angles.
§ 8. 9. _Alkabucius_; i.e. (says Warton, Hist. E. P. ii. 357, ed. 1871) Abdilazi Alchabitius, whose Introductiorium ad scientiam judicialem astronomæ was printed in 1473, and afterwards. Mr. Brae quotes the very passage to which Chaucer refers, which I here quote from the edition of 1482, as described in my note to l. 119 of The Compleint of Mars (see vol. i. p. 500); viz. 'Unumquodque istorum signorum diuiditur in 30 partes equales, que gradus vocantur. Et gradus diuiditur in 60 minuta; et minutum in 60 secunda; et secundum in 60 tertia. Similiterque sequuntur quarta, scilicet et quinta, ascendendo usque ad infinita'; Alchabitii Differentia Prima.
These minute subdivisions were never used; it was a mere affectation of accuracy, the like of which was never attained.
§ 10. 5. _in Arabiens_, amongst the Arabians. But he goes on to speak only of the Roman names of the months. Yet I may observe that in MS. Ii. 3. 3, at fol. 97, the Arabian, Syrian, and Egyptian names of the months are given as well as the Roman.
§ 16. 12. _& every minut 60 secoundes_; i.e. every minute contains 60 seconds. The sentence, in fact, merely comes to this. 'Every degree of the border contains four minutes (_of time_), and every minute (of time) contains sixty seconds (of time).' This is consistent and intelligible. Mr. Brae proposes to read '_four_ seconds'; this would mean that 'every degree of the border contains four minutes (of time), and every minute (_of the border_) contains four seconds (of time).' Both statements are true; but, in the latter case, Chaucer should have repeated the words 'of the bordure.' However this may be, the proposed emendation lacks authority, although the reprint of Speght changed 'lx' into 'fourtie,' which comes near to 'four.' But the reprint of Speght is of no value at all. See Mr. Brae's preface, p. 4, for the defence of his proposed emendation, which is entirely needless.
§ 17. 6. _Ptholome._ The St. John's MS. has _ptolomeys almagest_. '_Almagest_, a name given by the Arabs to the [Greek: megalê syntaxis], or _great collection_, the celebrated work of Ptolemy, the astronomer of Alexandria [floruit A.D. 140-160]. It was translated into Arabic about the year A.D. 827, under the patronage of the Caliph Al Mamun, by the Jew Alhazen ben Joseph, and the Christian Sergius. The word is the Arabic article _al_ prefixed to the Greek _megistus_, "greatest," a name probably derived from the title of the work itself, or, as we may judge from the superlative adjective, partly from the estimation in which it was held.'--English Cyclopædia; Arts and Sciences, i. 223. The Almagest 'was in thirteen books. Ptolemy wrote also four books of judicial astrology. He was an Egyptian astrologist, and flourished under Marcus Antoninus. He is mentioned in the Sompnour's Tale [D 2289], and the Wif of Bathes Prologue, ll. 182, 324.'--Warton, Hist. E. P. ii. 356, ed. 1871. The word _almagest_ occurs in the Milleres Tale, near the beginning (A 3208), and twice in the Wif of Bathes Prologue (D 183, 325).
Chaucer says the obliquity of the ecliptic, according to Ptolemy, was 23° 50'. The _exact_ value, according to Ptolemy, was 23° 51' 20"; _Almagest_, lib. i. c. 13. But Chaucer did not care about the odd degree, and gives it nearly enough. See note to ii. 25. 19.
8. _tropos_, a turning; Chaucer gives it the sense of _agaynward_, i.e. in a returning direction.
14. The equinoctial was supposed to revolve, because it was the 'girdle' of the _primum mobile_, and turned with it. See note below to l. 28.
14, 15. 'As I have shewed thee in the solid sphere.' This is interesting, as shewing that Chaucer had already given his son some lessons on the motions of the heavenly bodies, before writing this treatise.
27. _angulus._ We should rather have expected the word _spera_ or _sphera_; cf. 'the sper solide' above, l. 15.
28. 'And observe, that this first moving (_primus motus_) is so called from the first movable (_primum mobile_) of the eighth sphere, which moving or motion is from East to West,' &c. There is an _apparent_ confusion in this, because the _primum mobile_ was the _ninth_ sphere (see Plate V, fig. 10); but it may be called the movable of the eighth, as _giving motion to it_. An attempt was made to explain the movements of the heavenly bodies by imagining the earth to be in the centre, surrounded by a series of concentric spheres, or rather shells, like the coats of an onion. Of these the seven innermost, all revolving with different velocities, each carried with it a planet. Beyond these was an eighth sphere, which was at first supposed to be divided into two parts, the inner part being the _firmamentum_, and the outer part the _primum mobile_; hence the _primum mobile_ might have been called 'the first moving of the eighth sphere,' as accounting for the more important part of the motion of the said sphere. It is simpler, however, to make these distinct, in which case the eighth sphere is _firmamentum_ or _sphæra stellarum fixarum_, which was supposed to have a very slow motion from West to East round the poles of the _zodiac_ to account for the precession of the equinoxes, whilst the ninth sphere, or _primum mobile_, whirled round from East to West once in 24 hours, carrying all the inner spheres with it, by which means the ancients accounted for the diurnal revolution. This ninth sphere had for its poles the north and south poles of the heavens, and its 'girdle' (or great circle equidistant from the poles) was the equator itself. Hence the equator is here called the 'girdle of the first moving.' As the planetary spheres revolved _in an opposite direction_, thus accounting for the _forward_ motion of the sun and planets in the ecliptic or near it, the _primum mobile_ was considered to revolve in a _backward_ or _unnatural_ direction, and hence Chaucer's apostrophe to it (Man of Lawes Tale, B 295):--
'O firste moevyng cruel firmament, With thy diurnal sweigh that crowdest ay And hurlest all from Est til Occident, That naturelly wolde holde another way.'
That is--'O thou _primum mobile_, thou cruel firmament, that with thy diurnal revolution (or revolution once in 24 hours round the axis of the equator) continually forcest along and whirlest all the celestial bodies from East to West, which _naturally_ would wish to follow the course of the sun in the zodiac from West to East.' This is well illustrated by a sidenote in the Ellesmere MS. to the passage in question, to this effect:--'Vnde Ptholomeus, libro i. cap. 8. Primi motus celi duo sunt, quorum vnus est qui mouet totum semper ab Oriente in Occidentem vno modo super orbes, &c. Item aliter vero motus est qui mouet orbem stellarum currencium contra motum primum, videlicet, ab Occidente in Orientum super alios duos polos[72].' That is, the two chief motions are that of the _primum mobile_, which carries everything round from East to West, and that of the fixed stars, which is a slow motion from West to East round the axis of the zodiac, to account for precession. This exactly explains the well-known passage in the Frankeleines Tale (C. T., F 1280):--
'And by his eighte spere in his werking, He knew ful wel how fer Alnath was shove Fro the heed of thilke fixe Aries above That in the ninthe spere considered is.'
Here the eight spheres are the eight inner spheres which revolve round the axis of the zodiac in an easterly direction, whilst the ninth sphere, or _primum mobile_, contained both the theoretical or _fixed_ first point of Aries from which measurements were made, and also the _signs_ of the zodiac as distinct from the _constellations_. But Alnath, being an actual star, viz, [alpha] Arietis[73], was in the _eighth_ sphere; and the distance between its position and that of the first point of Aries at any time afforded a measure of the amount of precession. Mr. Brae rightly remarks that Tyrwhitt's readings in this passage are correct (except that _eighte speres_ should be _eightespere_), and those of Mr. Wright and Dr. Morris (from the Harleian MS.) are incorrect.
It may be as well to add that a later refinement was to insert a crystalline sphere, to account for the precession; so that the order stood thus: seven spheres of planets; the eighth, of fixed stars; the ninth, or crystalline; the tenth, or _primum mobile_; and, beyond these, an empyræan or theological heaven, so to speak, due to no astronomical wants, but used to express the place of residence of celestial beings[74]. Hence the passage in Milton, P. L. iii. 481:--
'They pass the planets seven, and pass the fix'd, And that crystalline sphere whose balance weighs The trepidation talk'd, and that first mov'd.'
i.e. They pass the seven planetary spheres; then the sphere of fixed stars; then the crystalline or transparent one, whose swaying motion or libration measures the amount of the precession and nutation so often talked of; and then, the sphere of the _primum mobile_ itself. But Milton clearly himself believed in the Copernican system; see Paradise Lost, viii. 121-140, where the _primum mobile_ is described in the lines--
'that swift Nocturnal and diurnal rhomb supposed, Invisible else above all stars, the wheel Of day and night.'
§ 18. 8. _compowned by 2 & 2._ This means that in the _best_ astrolabes, _every_ almicantarath for every degree of latitude was marked; as may be seen in Metius. In others, including the one given by Chaucer to his son, they were marked only for every other degree. See Part II. sect. 5, l. 2.
§ 19. 7. _cenith_, as here used, has a totally different meaning from that of _senith_, in l. 1 above. The _senith_ in l. 1 is what we still call the _zenith_; but the _cenith_ in l. 7 means the point of the horizon denoting the sun's place in azimuth. Contrary to what one might expect, the _latter_ is the true original meaning, as the word _zenith_ is corrupted from the root of the word which we now spell _azimuth_. The Arabic _as-sant_ is a way or path; _al-samt_, a point of the horizon, and, secondly, an azimuthal circle. The plural of _al-samt_ is _assum[=u]t_, whence _azimuth_. But _zenith_ is a corruption of _semt_, from _samt al-r[=a]s_, the Arabic name of the vertex of heaven (_r[=a]s_ meaning _a head_); and the qualifying _al-r[=a]s_, the most important part of the phrase, has been improperly dropped. So far from the reading _cenith_ being wrong here, it is most entirely right, and may be found (better spelt _cenit_) in the same sense in Messahala. See p. 213, second footnote. For _cenith_, some late copies have _signet_, evidently taken from the Latin word _signum_. They make the same mistake even in l. 12 of section 18.
§ 21. 4. _sterres fixes_, fixed stars; here the _s_ again appears in a plural adjective of French derivation; see note above, to § 5. 8. In MSS. Ii. 3. 3 and Ii. 1. 13 in the Cambridge University Library, is an interesting list of the 49 stars most usually placed upon the Astrolabe. The stars which are represented by the points of the tongues in Fig. 2 are the same as those in the diagram from which Fig. 2 is copied, the original of which is in MS. A. I have slightly altered the positions of the points of the tongues, to make them somewhat more correct. The following is the list of the stars there shewn; most of their names are written in the MS. Cf. footnote on p. 186.
_Within the Zodiac._ In _Aries_, Mirach, or [beta] Andromedæ, shewn by a short tongue above Aries; in _Taurus_, Algol, or [beta] Persei, as marked; in _Libra_, Aliot or Alioth, i.e. [epsilon] Ursæ Majoris (the third horse, next the cart, in Charles's Wain), as marked; also Alramech, Arcturus, or [alpha] Boötis, shewn by the tongue projecting above Libra; in _Scorpio_, Alpheta, Alphecca, or [alpha] Coronæ Borealis, as marked; in _Sagittarius_, Raz Alhagus, or [alpha] Ophiuchi, near Alpheta; in _Capricornus_, Altair or [alpha] Aquilæ and Vega or [alpha] Lyræ, as marked, whilst near Vega is the unmarked Arided, or [alpha] Cygni; and in _Pisces_, Markab or [alpha] Pegasi.
_Without the Zodiac._ In _Aries_, under _Oriens_, the slight projection marks [beta] Ceti or Deneb Kaitos, the Whale's Tail, and the next curiously shaped projection (with side-tongues probably referring to other stars) means Batnkaitos, the Whale's Belly, apparently [zeta] Ceti; next come the long tongue for Menkar or [alpha] Ceti, the Whale's Nose; the star Aldebaran or Bull's Eye, [alpha] Tauri; Rigel or [beta] Orionis, Orion's Foot; Alhabor or Sirius, the Dog-star, marked by a rude drawing of a dog's head, the star itself being at the tip of his tongue; then Algomeisa, Procyon, or [alpha] Canis Minoris, marked by a tongue pointing to the left, whilst the long broad tongue pointing upwards is Regulus, Kalbalased, or [alpha] Leonis; the small tongue above the letter I in the border is Alphard or Cor Hydræ. Above _Occidens_, in _Libra_, the first tongue is Algorab or [delta] Corvi, and the next Spica Virginis or Azimech; close to the 8th degree of Scorpio is [alpha] Libræ, and close to the beginning of Sagittarius is a small head, denoting the Scorpion, at the tip of the tongue of which is the bright Kalbalacrab or Antares. The last, a projection below the letter X, is Deneb Algebi or the Goat's Tail, i.e. [delta] Capricorni.
7. That is, the little point at the end of each tongue of metal is technically called the 'centre' of the star, and denotes its exact position.
9. The stars of the North are those to the North of the _zodiac_, not of the _equator_.
12. _Aldeberan_, &c.; the stars Aldebaran ([alpha] Tauri) and Algomeisa ([alpha] Canis Minoris) are called stars of the south, because they are to the south of the ecliptic; but as they are meanwhile (see Fig. 2) also to the north of the equator, they of course rise to the N. of the Eastern point of the horizon. The longitude of stars was always measured along the ecliptic, which is denoted in Fig. 2 by the outermost circle of the metal ring on which the names of the signs are written.
In one of the tracts in MS. G (dated A.D. 1486), p. 30, we find 'Aldebaran, in the first gre of ge_min_is (_sic_), of the nature of Mars and Venus'; and 'Algomeisa, canis minor, in the xvij gr_e_ of Canc_er_, of the nature of Mars and M_er_cury.'
29. _Amiddes_, &c. Observe that the Ecliptic line _in the midst_ of the _celestial_ zodiac, a belt 12° broad, is on the _outer edge_ of the zodiac as shewn in the astrolabe, which is only 6° broad and shews only the northern half of that belt. The 'way of the sun' is elsewhere used of the sun's apparent _diurnal_ path (see Part ii. sect. 30); but it here refers, as is more usual, to the _annual_ path.
34. _streitnes_, narrowness, closeness, smallness of size. In Fig. 2, I have marked every degree in the southern half of the zodiac, but only every _fifth_ degree in the northern, in order to avoid an appearance of crowding in so small a figure. In Chaucer's own Astrolabe, every _other_ degree was marked all round.
40. Here Chaucer gives at least three reasons for the name of 'zodiac.' The true one is the second, 'for that the sterres that ben there fixed ben disposed in signes of bestes, or shape like bestes.' But these imaginary shapes are very absurd and arbitrary.
50. Not only the influences here assigned to the signs, but others due to planets, may be found in 'Porphyrii Philosophi introductio in Claudii Ptolomæi opus de affectibus astrorum,' fol. Basileæ, n.d. p. 198. I here add a few extracts from the MS. in Trinity College, Cambridge (marked R. 15. 18), to shew the nature of the old astrology. I choose them with especial reference to Aries. The other signs are spoken of in a similar manner. 'It is principally to be considered that the signes of hevyn haue their_e_ strenght and propre significaciou_n_ vpon the membris of eny man; as, Aries hath respect to the hed, taurus to the neck, ge_min_is (_sic_) the Armys, Cancer the brest, leo the hert, virgo the bowels, &c.; as it shall shew in the Chapiters folowyng. Secundarily it is to be noted that plotholomee (_sic_) saith, that to touche with instrument of yrou_n_ while the mone is in the signe of the same membre, is for to be dred; let the surgen beware, and the letter of blode, let hym be aferd to touche that membre w_i_t_h_ yren_e_, in the which the mone shal be.'--MS. G; Trad C. p. 12.
'Thenne Aries hath respect to the hed; And this signe is hote and dry, fiery & colerik. Saturne hath ij witnes in Ariete, a triplicitate and a terme. Jubit_er_ also hath ij, a triplicitate and a term_e_. Mars hath iij testimonials or iij fortitudis in Ariete, A hows, A face, and A terme. The sonne hath iij fortitudis in Ariete, s_cilicet_, an exaltaciou_n_, a triplicite, and a face. Venus hath ij testimonials, A terme and a face. M_er_cury hath on_e_ testymony, that is to sey, a term_e_. And luna in Ariete hath no testimoniall. For the which it is to know, that the influens of the planet_is_ may be fortyfied v maner of wayes. And these v man_er_ be called v fortitud_is_ of planet_is_, or testimonials, which be these: _domus_, _exaltacio_, _triplicitas_, _terminus_, and _facies_. _Domus_ gevith to a planet v fortitud_is_; And a planet in his hows is lyke a kynge in his hall, And in the high trone of his gl_or_ie. A planet in his _exaltacioun_ is lyke a kynge when he is crowned. A planet in his _triplicite_ is like a kynge in hono_ur_, Amonge his sencible people. A planet in his _terme_ is As a man_n_ among_es_ his kynnesmen_n_ And fryndis. _Facies_ gyvith to a planet that thyng the which rowme gyvith to a maistre. Wherfore _facies_ gyvith only on fortitude, _Terminus_ ij, _Triplicitas_ iij, _Exaltacio_ iiij, And _domus_ v. And for the more clere declaraciou_n_, the dignytes of planet_is_ in signes be co_m_p_re_hendid in this figure ensuynge, &c.[75]'--Same MS., Tract C. p. 13.
'The dygnytes of planet_is_ in the signes, most speciall they be to be noted in iudicials. When the mone is _in Ariete_, it is not gode, but vtterly to be exshewed, both for seke And disesid, for to shafe their_e_ hede or to boist in the eris or in the nek; nor loke þou let no blode in the vayn of the hede. How-be-it, benyficiall it is to begynne eu_er_y worke that þou woldest bryng aboute son_e_. But that thynge that is stabill ought to be eschewed. In this signe it is necessary to dele with noble estat_is_ And rich men, And for to go in-to A bayn_e_ [_bath_][76].'--Same MS., Tract C. p. 14.
54, 5. See Prologue, l. 73. As the zodiak is here called a part of the eighth sphere, so we have been before told that the equinoctial is the girdle of the ninth sphere; see note above to sect 17. l. 28.
57. _evene parties_, equal parts. That is, the equinoctial bisects the zodiac. But the northern half _looks_ much smaller than the southern on the Astrolabe, owing to the manner in which the zodiac is there represented, viz. by projection on the plane of the equator.